Golden perch
Excellent
Prime. Hop soft plastics and vibes around the timber, or fish shrimp and worms on the bottom.
Windamere Dam Fishing Report
Updated Mon, 9 Nov 2026 from live weather and tide data
The Cudgegong River storage south-east of Mudgee: golden perch the top catch, stocked cod and silver perch, and a Bureau gauge at the wall.
2/5
Slow. Work for them.Conditions favor short windows and patient fishing.
Level
548.16 m292,591 ML
Air / High
13 °C / 21 °C
Wind
SE 5 km/h
Sources: Bureau of Meteorology gauge 421148, Open-Meteo, solunar calculated for these coordinates.
Today's Fishing Report
Windamere Dam is fishing in its best temperature window, with the bite spread across the day. The gauge reads 548.16 m, holding steady. Today brings clear skies, wind SE around 5 km/h, rising pressure near 1018 hPa and a high of 21 °C. Water sits around 19 °C for the season (estimated). With the new moon, the solunar majors run 11:08 PM-1:08 AM and 11:35 AM-1:35 PM: the windows to build the day around.
Murray cod
Closed today
Reopens 1 Dec 2026. Closed 1 September to 30 November in all waters except Blowering and Copeton dams.
Tie on: Soft plastic on a 1/4 oz jighead · Small hardbody, shallow diver · Squid jig, size 3.0 · Fresh pipi or worm on a small hook. Prime windows: 11:08 PM-1:08 AM, 11:35 AM-1:35 PM, 4:58 AM-5:58 AM. Warmer at 26 °C. The solunar majors shift about 50 minutes later.
Before you go
New South Wales requires a fishing licence for most fishing, from A$7.00. New South Wales fishing licence: cost, rules and where to buy →
Chasing murray cod here? Check the size and bag limits with DPIRD NSW before you keep anything; the Murray cod page has the seasons and the tactics.
Fishing times for Windamere Dam today
Hour-by-hour bite forecast for today from sunrise (05:55), sunset (19:34), the moon and today's score. Tap a bar to see why.
Bite planner
Solunar majors 11:08 PM-1:08 AM and 11:35 AM-1:35 PM; minor 4:58 AM-5:58 AM. New Moon, 0% lit.
Water and weather
Live readings from Bureau of Meteorology station 421148 (WINDAMERE DAM).
Storage level, last 30 days
Bureau of Meteorology Water Data Online, station 421148. Latest reading 2026-11-07 22:45.
Right now
Latest readings
Air temp13 °C
High / Low21 °C / 5 °C
WindSE 5 km/h, gusts 14 km/h
Pressure1018.0 hPa, rising
Sky / Rain0% cloud, 0%
Sunrise / Sunset05:55 / 19:34
MoonNew Moon, 0%
Water temp (seasonal)~19 °C est.
7-day fishing forecast: which day to fish Windamere Dam
The best day on Windamere Dam this week looks like Friday 13 Nov, at 5 out of 5, against 2 today.
Best day this week: Friday, 13 Nov — excellent at 5/5, falling pressure, usually the best window of a week.
Today, 9 Nov — Tough
Conditions favor short windows and patient fishing.
- Solunar majors
- 11:08 PM-1:08 AM and 11:35 AM-1:35 PM
- Minor period
- 4:58 AM-5:58 AM
- Sun
- 05:55 to 19:34
- Moon
- New Moon, 0% lit
- Sky and wind
- Clear, 14 km/h
- Rain chance
- 0%
Forecast-based scores, less reliable further out.
Species guide
The species that matter on Windamere Dam: seasons written for the southern year, and how to fish each one. Today's ratings live in the report above.
Murray cod
Closed 1 September to 30 November in NSW, Victoria and the ACT, and 1 August to 31 October in Queensland; check the exempt lakes
Closed now Reopens 1 Dec 2026. Closed 1 September to 30 November in all waters except Blowering and Copeton dams. Rule as read from DPIRD NSW on 2026-09-23.
The giant of the inland rivers and the big lakes (Hume, Mulwala, Eildon). A snag fish that eats big lures, and a species with a closed season across the Murray-Darling.
Golden perch
Best: November to April
Yellowbelly. The bread-and-butter native of the Murray-Darling lakes and rivers; loves warm water, structure and a lure worked slowly past its nose. Prime. Hop soft plastics and vibes around the timber, or fish shrimp and worms on the bottom.
When to come: the Windamere Dam calendar
Activity by species and month for the southern year, and how the water warms and cools. Tap any cell.
Species activity by month
1 = slow, 5 = peak. Current month highlighted. January is midsummer here.
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Murray cod
Golden perch
SlowPeak
Water temperature through the year
Typical surface temperature for this water type in degrees Celsius; today is around 19 °C (estimated, not a reading).
Angler reports
Real reports from real anglers, reviewed before publishing. Nothing here is copied from a shop or a charter. The water log below tracks each day automatically.
No angler reports yetBe the first: your report helps every angler who checks Windamere Dam today.
Water log, last days
Auto-logged from live dataSun, Nov 8
4/5 Good. Solid day ahead. Stable-to-falling pressure and workable wind line things up. Golden perch led the card at excellent. High of 19 °C, wind to 18 km/h.
Sat, Nov 7
3/5 Fair. Fish the windows. A steady pattern: dawn and dusk carry the day. Golden perch led the card at excellent. High of 25 °C, wind to 26 km/h.
Fri, Nov 6
4/5 Good. Solid day ahead. Stable-to-falling pressure and workable wind line things up. Golden perch led the card at excellent. High of 23 °C, wind to 11 km/h.
Before you go
Licence
NSW Recreational Fishing Fee, from A$7.00, the same for residents and visitors. Details and where to buy →
Regulations
Size and bag limits, closed seasons and marine park zones are set by DPIRD NSW and change: confirm the current rules on the agency page linked from the New South Wales licence page before you keep anything.
Access
The NSW Recreational Fishing Fee, A$7 for three days at the cheapest, applies, per the New South Wales licence page on this site.
Storage levels
Compare it with every other storage in the state on New South Wales dam levels today.
About this water
Windamere Dam is a lake in New South Wales, Australia, covered from the New South Wales reports and listed in all Australia waters.
Fishing Windamere Dam: the full guide
The lake
Windamere Dam sits on the Cudgegong River about 30 kilometres upstream of Mudgee and 19 kilometres south-west of Rylstone. WaterNSW lists it at 367 gigalitres and 20 square kilometres, operated with Burrendong Dam downstream to supply irrigation, stock and household water in the Cudgegong and Macquarie valleys and to provide flood mitigation and environmental flows. Cudgegong Waters Park, on the southern foreshore about 13 kilometres south of the wall, has cabins, caravan and camping sites, a kiosk and the public boat ramp, and a local Scout camp also takes public bookings. The Bureau of Meteorology’s Windamere gauge provides the reading and the 30-day chart shown here.
Species and seasons
WaterNSW names golden perch as the top catch, and DPIRD’s 2026/27 plan proposes 75,000 more after the 2025/26 release: they are found on the rocky points, the drowned timber and the drop-offs from spring through autumn, trolled with deep divers, cast with lipless crankbaits, spinnerbaits and plastics, and taken on shrimp and yabbies from the bank. Murray cod are stocked and fish the timber in the warm months, closed from 1 September to 30 November under the New South Wales rule computed on the species card. Windamere is on DPIRD’s lists of dams where silver perch and freshwater catfish may be taken, and redfin school in the bays through winter. Carp are present and may not be released alive.
Where to fish it
Cudgegong Waters Park and its ramp give access to the southern end of the lake, and the perch come within reach of the bank at dawn and dusk in the warm months; a boat opens the timbered arms and the long rocky shorelines, where trolling the drop-offs finds the schools. In clear water, lighter leaders and longer casts tend to draw more bites. Below the wall, WaterNSW notes rainbow and brown trout in the Cudgegong River, which follows the NSW trout stream closure.
Reading the report
The water temperature estimate, labelled as an estimate, is the switch: the perch feed from the warm band up and shut down in the cold, and the calendar shows October to April as the season. The chart shows the draw-down, and the wind row decides the launch because the main basin is exposed. Pressure matters for the summer cod, a falling barometer before a storm often bringing on the bite.
Licence, access and rules
The NSW Recreational Fishing Fee, A$7 for three days at the cheapest, applies, per the New South Wales licence page on this site. WaterNSW notes that lake access is from the boat ramp at Cudgegong Waters Park, not from its own ramp, and closes its recreation areas on total fire ban days. The DPIRD limits, the cod closure and the silver perch and catfish exemption lists are linked in the sources.
Common questions
Is Windamere good for golden perch?
WaterNSW names golden perch as the lake’s top catch, and DPIRD keeps stocking them; spring to autumn on the points, the timber and the drop-offs is the season.
Where do I launch a boat at Windamere?
At the public ramp in Cudgegong Waters Park on the southern foreshore; WaterNSW’s own ramp gives no public access to the lake.
Is fishing good at Windamere Dam right now?
Check the daily report at the top of this page: it is regenerated every morning from live data. Today's read: Slow. Work for them. Conditions favor short windows and patient fishing.
Nearby waters
Where this page's numbers come from
- Storage and river readings
- Bureau of Meteorology, Water Data Online, station 421148 — WINDAMERE DAM
- Open-Meteo forecast model
- https://open-meteo.com/
- Moon and solunar windows
- Calculated on this site
- Pages checked
- The written guide on this page
Pablo Ruiz Quintero
Readings refresh on a 30-minute window. The full method, with every figure and its source, is on How our reports are made. Something wrong here? Tell us and it goes in the log with the date.